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Friday, November 18, 2011

REVIEW: The Wild Hunt (2009)

Setting a boring story about a boring romance inside a giant LARP
game doesn’t make it any less boring. Despite the intriguing concept, I
just couldn’t get involved in the core storyline of The Wild Hunt,
and by the time things picked up in the last act it was too late. I was
so uninterested in the characters that by then that even transitioning
from fake violence with foam swords to real head-crushing couldn’t make
me care.

The movie opens with Erik (Ricky Mabe) being sad about his girlfriend
Lyn (Tiio Horn), who sort-of breaks up with him and then promptly runs
off to the woods to LARP and play courtesean to a “barbarian lord.” Why
do we care? That’s a good question - one that I never figured out. As
far as I can tell, it’s because we’re supposed to relate to how moody
and whiny they are and how pensive poor Erik looks as he watches traffic
go by. When he heads into the woods to retrieve her, he’s sucked into
the game and forced into the middle of the conflict between several
warring factions, including the Nordic warriors led by his brother,
Bjorn (Mark Krupa).

It’s a well-constructed film, even if it lends a bit more drama to
the LARPers at times than is necessary. It’s hard to discern whether
it’s poking fun at the game or taking it seriously, and this makes for a
few wild shifts in tone. But despite the interesting ancillary
characters, the plot is hard to take seriously when it doesn’t seem like
it takes itself seriously for most of the film.

I can understand why this has gotten some attention - it’s generally
well acted and takes some turns that are somewhat predictable but still
have enough spin to make them interesting. It’s just a shame that
there’s no backbone to the plot. Consistency isn’t necessarily key in
filmmaking, but if you’re messing around with such drastic tonal shifts,
you’d better make sure you’re doing it deliberately, or else you’re
preventing your audience from investing anything in your story. I’d
recommend the far more interesting documentary Darkon if you’re intrigued by the LARPing and want characters who are more fully drawn (since they’re real).